The Professional Activities Fund (PAF) exists to enhance professional development activities in the engineering undergraduate program at UBC Vancouver. It is designed to support co-curricular activities and projects that lie outside of, yet are complementary to, the engineering curriculum. All PAF funded activities must be in support of this mandate.
PAF collects fees from all undergraduate UBC Engineering students each fall. Only currently enrolled undergraduate UBC Engineering students may benefit from the fund.
Please look through the Professional Activities Fund Mandate carefully before applying.
General PAF Criteria
PAF Funding is awarded in the three categories: Faculty Requests, Travel & Conferences, and Projects. There are subcategories of Projects designated for Design Projects, and Professional Development Opportunities. Each category has specific criteria.
All applications must meet the following eligibility criteria:
- Be student-run and organized, and have a clear goal.
- The application must support the professional development of undergraduate UBC Engineering students, and be separate from the engineering curriculum, but related to the profession of engineering.
- Applicants must be currently enrolled undergraduate UBC Engineering students within the PAF fiscal cycle of application.
- At least 75% of the beneficiaries of the application must be currently enrolled undergraduate UBC Engineering students. If it is possible to distinguish direct costs per beneficiary (such as in the case of travel), PAF will only provide funding for currently enrolled undergraduate UBC Engineering students.
- A single initiative may only be funded through one PAF category (e.g., either Travel & Conferences or Projects, not both).
- PAF only provides funding for initiatives within its current fiscal cycle (Sept 1st – Aug 31st).
- Applications must have a balanced budget – PAF will not fund applications that project “carryover”, produce any profit, or intend to run a deficit.
- PAF does not fund organizations. PAF will provide funding for specific projects or travel, which may be applied to on behalf of an organization.
- PAF does not fund academic bursaries, awards, or grants.
- Applicants are responsible for providing final reports on the progress of their application. All funding will be disbursed through the APSC Finance Office (finance@apsc.ubc.ca). Claims require itemized receipts and must be signed by the primary applicant.
- Applicants are responsible for providing final reports on the progress of their application/initiative by the end of the fiscal cycle the funding was granted in (August 31). If a team/person does not submit a final report for an initiative that used PAF funding they are not eligible to receive funding in the next fiscal cycle.
PAF Categories
PAF is broken into three primary categories: Annual Faculty Requests, Travel & Conferences and Projects. These are described in detail on their respective pages and in the PAF Mandate. The flow chart below is intended to help applicants identify which category best fits their request.
